The prime minister is moving so fast that what seemed unthinkable just weeks ago must be considered a strong possibility at some point in the next few years: a merger between David Cameron’s majority wing of the Conservative Party and Nick Clegg’s Lib Dems.

It’s all changing so quickly right now, as I was reminded at the weekend. We drove past one of those now frayed Tory posters from the seemingly long distant election, this one featuring a grinning Gordon Brown (“I doubled the national debt. Let me do it again. Vote for me blah blah”). It looked as though it was a relic from a lost age, another era entirely. An era of Gordon Brown, an independent Conservative party and “old politics.” Consider that it was only six weeks or so ago that those posters went up.

Having improvised a temporary realignment of British politics in the intervening period so audaciously, how much further does David Cameron intend to go on his journey? How will he attempt to make permanent his temporary gains?

At the moment he has almost no obstacles in his way — he is in the untouchable phase of his premiership. So whatever he plans next for his stunned party had best be relatively quick to take advantage.

How’s it been for you so far? The supposed New Politics – with its transparency, coalition-building and calm consensus?

In my column for the paper today I’ve attempted to unravel the farce of the negotiations between the three parties and concluded that really, all said and done, this is not a very sensible way to conduct the nation’s business in an economic crisis.

“During the election Mr. Clegg in particular made repeated references to a supposed “new politics”. Unlike under the old two party duopoly of Labour and the Conservatives, if the Lib Dems had bargaining power there would be greater transparency and sensible deals could be done between parties in the national interest. As former Home Secretary John Reid put it last night: “If this is the new politics, I don’t think the public is going to find it very attractive.”

Indeed, one casualty of this farce is likely to be electoral reform. The British have had a voting system that has produced results needing coalition negotiations only twice since 1945. This glimpse of the Mr. Clegg’s “new politics” is unlikely to make many want a system that makes it the norm.

What is any voter, interested observer or investor to make of this? One can only conclude that Britain—or much of its governing class—has lost its collective marbles in the face of an economic crisis.

I wrote during the election that it was as though the campaign was happening on another planet. As though the three parties were sleep-walking or too scared to tell the public the truth that the markets are hunting countries that have excessive debts and no serious plan to tackle them. I thought the various parties might wake up after polling day, realize the gravity of the situation and act swiftly. They are still asleep.”